About

A brief history of runtimes

Every decade, a new abstraction makes software faster to write and slower to run.
Elide breaks that pattern.

1970s

Machine Code & Assembly

Software written directly for hardware. Maximum performance, zero portability. Every machine was an island.

1972

C & Unix

Ritchie and Thompson proved systems software could be portable without being slow. C became the lingua franca.

1991

Java & Python

Virtual machines and interpreters traded performance for productivity. Enterprise chose Java. Scientists chose Python. The split began.

2008

Chrome & V8

Google proved interpreted languages could be fast with JIT compilation. Node.js followed. Everyone started writing servers in a browser language.

Now

One binary. Your favorite language. Native performance.

JVM Toolchain

The best option for the JVM: Elide.

The JVM runs the majority of enterprise software on earth—and ships with some of the slowest, most complex toolchains in modern development. Maven, Gradle, Bazel: verbose config, slow builds, impossible learning curves. Elide brings speed, simplicity, and ease of use to your JVM toolchain.

DX

NPM-like invocation model with a beautiful TUI

Speed

Powered by Native Image for insanely fast startup

Config

Works out of the box. No plugins or config needed

Build DSL

Declarative + imperative, powered by Pkl

Compatible by default

Same inputs. Faster everything.

Elide is a drop-in replacement for your standard JVM tools like Maven, Gradle, and Bazel. Your existing code, dependencies, and workflows—just faster.

	Elide	Maven	Gradle	Bazel
Cold start	~5ms	~3s	~6s	~10s
Config format	Pkl (typed)	XML	Groovy / KTS	Starlark
Zero config	✓	×	×	×
Native compilation	✓	×	×	×
Container images	Built-in	Plugin	Plugin	rules_oci
Multi-language	✓	JVM only	JVM only	✓
Learning curve	Minimal	Steep	Steep	Very steep